Frances Fitzgerald (Fine Gael)

Yesterday morning another family, the Ronan family in Kilkenny, experienced the terror and trauma of a so-called tiger kidnapping. Last week it was a family in Lucan. Now young children are being used as pawns in this horrific crime, which must be unbelievably disturbing and upsetting for the families involved. Why have the Government, the Garda and the banks not put in place the sort of security measures that would protect families and workers in the banks? Clearly, the incidence of such crimes is escalating, but this cannot be allowed to continue. It is a cause of serious concern and must be creating dreadful anxiety for bank officials who are afraid of being subjected to terror by these gangs. Are resources being given to the Garda to deal with the problem? Are subversive organisations involved? Do we have the resources in place to track down the perpetrators and deal with them effectively? This cannot be allowed to continue in the way we saw yesterday. Thank goodness nobody was hurt, but the psychological trauma experienced by the family and others within the last few weeks must be prevented. I propose an amendment to the Order of Business that the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform come to the House to address the issue. We are putting so much money into the banks and have considerable control over them. Surely this security issue can be dealt with in a more effective way. We must ensure no more families are subjected to this experience.

The Minister of State with responsibility for children has outlined the Government's recommendations which he said would address the issues raised in the Ryan report. One of the key issues was the availability of front-line staff to work with children at risk and in need of protection. It is, therefore, disturbing to read about the report from the HSE in The Irish Times today that the number of children in care who have a social worker has fallen by 7% this year. It makes a mockery of the recommendations made in the Ryan report if we do not have these services in place to deal with children in need of protection and care. I would like the Minister of State to come to the House for a realistic and honest discussion on how we can ensure the appalling abuses in this country over decades do not happen again and that the report is actually implemented, rather than simply left sitting there, as is the case. The report in The Irish Times this morning gives hard facts about the non-allocation of social workers and the reduction in services to children.